A sweet and innocent baby has died only two days after getting his four-month vaccinations. The baby died of meningitis, and now the parents and healthcare officials are blaming a random and unvaccinated person for being asymptomatic while infected with the disease for spreading it to the baby.

The easiest thing to do is blame the poor baby’s death on some anonymous, alleged villain running around spreading meningitis into the air. The media is gleefully using this story to sell vaccines, to elicit fear,and point the finger at the unvaccinated, but they are leaving out several pieces of information that people should know about.

TRENDING ON DC CLOTHESLINE:

Although asymptomatic carriage of both pathogenic and nonpathogenic N. meningitidis is common, few carriers develop invasive disease. For the majority of people, carriage is an immunizing process that results in a systemic, serogroup-specific protective antibody response. –CDC website

So first off, the CDC actually admits on their own website that IF Killy contracted meningococcus bacteria from an asymptomatic carrier, said carriers immune system was doing exactly what it is supposed to do: fight off the bacteria and naturally provide an immunity against the infection. However, Killy had just had his own immune system destroyed by his series of four-month vaccinations and likely couldn’t fight off the infection, if indeed he was exposed to a carrier.

Second, although it is absolutely devastating that a child has lost their life, important questions are not being asked by those who subjected their child to the onslaught of vaccines. Is there any evidence at all that this child actually came in contact with a person infected with the bacteria in question (an asymptomatic carrier)? This is important because ALL cases of meningitis are tracked by the Centers for Disease Control, meaning they would have known exactly who transmitted the bacterial infection to the baby. Since it’s being blamed on an anonymous person at the clinic where the baby received his vaccines, this should immediately be called into question because meningococcal disease (an infection by the meningococcus bacteria) and meningitis (inflammation of the spinal cord and meninges) are not the same.

IMPORTANCE OF RAPID CASE IDENTIFICATION

Immediate recognition and treatment of meningococcal disease is critical. Persons with suspected meningococcal disease should be treated promptly without waiting for laboratory confirmation. All suspect, probable, and confirmed meningococcal disease cases should be promptly reported to the appropriate health department to ensure that the proper prevention and control measures can be implemented.

IMPORTANCE OF SURVEILLANCE

Surveillance data are used to monitor the impact of meningococcal disease in the United States, and to evaluate changes in the epidemiology of meningococcal disease over time. Surveillance data are also used to guide public health policy and development of prevention and control strategies. Laboratory surveillance to monitor the molecular epidemiology of N. meningitidis is also important. High-quality surveillance data and collection of circulating isolates from a broad and representative population are crucial to follow disease trends, make vaccine policy recommendations, monitor vaccine impact, and guide development of new vaccines. –CDC website

The other piece of information that is perhaps the most important is being ignored by the media. Meningitis is a side effect of the vaccines administered to Killy. He could have died of vaccine-induced meningitis. Although it is rare, so is catching the meningococcus bacteria in the first place. This information is either being willfully ignored in order to place the blame elsewhere or no one actually really cares how this child got meningitis. The vaccines that the CDC recommends at four months are a HIB, PCV, and Rotavirus, DTaP, Polio and Hep B – which could have caused meningitis.

The following information/package inserts list meningitis as an adverse event which has been reported after receiving the Pentacel and Pedarix vaccines. When a child is given vaccines at 4 months of age, a pediatrician will typically give one of these (in addition to other vaccines).

In fact, not just the viruses and bacteria in vaccines cause meningitis. Many viruses and bacterias can cause meningitis. Meningitis occurs as a reaction to an infection. Strep pneumoniae, Neisseria meningitidis (of which around 10% of the population is a natural carrier of, walking around with it in the back of their nose and throat), Haemophilus influenzae, Listeria, and viruses like enteroviruses, herpes simplex, HIV, mumps, West Nile Virus, rotavirus, etc. can all cause meningitis.

Inflammation of the meninges, the membranes that surround the brain and spinal cord, is called meningitis. Therefore, meningitis is not specifically caused only by the meningococcus bacteria, it can be caused by any number of viral or bacterial infections – including those in vaccines.

For someone to develop Meningitis, the bacteria needs to enter the bloodstream and travel to the brain and spinal cord to cause acute bacterial meningitis, or the bacteria would need to directly invade the meninges. This may be caused by an ear or sinus infection, a skull fracture, or, rarely, after some surgeries. However, it’s important to remember that bacterial and viral components are injected directly into a tiny infants muscle during vaccination. They are then are processed by the immune system via the bloodstream and have the opportunity to develop into meningitis, as it clearly states on vaccine package inserts.